A friend sent me
this email which links to the Crusty Old Dean bewailing the continuing numerical
decline of The Episcopal Church (TEC):
The
Crusty Old Dean is at it again: http://crustyoldean.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-collapse-is-here.html
Most of
what he writes, makes sense to me. But until at least 20% of the TEC power
structure agrees with his ideas, nothing will happen. I say 20% because it’s
the minimum for voices dissenting from the status quo to compel attention to
their views. Of course, there is a gap in time between 20% and 50.1% but we
have to start somewhere.
In response, I wrote
that I’m becoming increasingly pessimistic about Christianity in general and
the Episcopal Church in particular:
·
The
quality of leadership continues to decline, a decline compounded by some
dioceses creating local alternatives to seminary (my anecdotal assessment);
·
There
appears to be no increase in the number of congregations that are actually
growing;
·
Too much
money and other resources are wasted on governance at the diocesan, provincial
and national levels (not quite as bad as in the military, but too many headquarters
for the number and size of the frontline units, often siphoning the best
leaders out of those frontline units for other positions);
·
Busyness
masquerades as productive work and leaders resist naming that busyness for what
it is, finding business as usual more satisfying and within their area of
expertise than actual transformative leadership;
·
The
continuing secularization of society (is Marianne Williamson’s candidacy for
the presidency a final hoorah for widespread interest in spirituality – or self-help
that is labelled spirituality – in the US?).
Some congregations are exciting places in which persons experience
healing, community vanquishes loneliness, meaning displaces anomie and despair,
the disadvantaged receive help and individuals live more abundantly. Unfortunately,
these congregations seem few and far between, regardless of whether they
display an Episcopal flag or symbols of another denomination or religion.
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